SUMMARY
The CPC (Coalition des patriotes pour le changement, Coalition of Patriots for Change) was a rebel coalition in the Central African Republic, formed on 15 December 2020 by six armed groups that had largely been enemies until then. Its members were three factions from the former Séléka, the MPC, the UPC, and the FPRC. They were joined by the 3R, a self-defence group that claimed to protect the Fulani population, and by two anti-Balaka factions, anti-Balaka Mokom and anti-Balaka Ngaissona. The coalition was notable for uniting the predominantly Muslim ex-Séléka groups with the predominantly Christian anti-Balaka militias that had been the principal antagonists of the 2013 and 2014 sectarian violence, an alliance held together largely by their common opposition to the government and their ties to former president François Bozizé. At its formation its members together controlled around two-thirds of the country.
The CPC was orchestrated by Bozizé, who had ruled the country from 2003 to 2013 and had returned from exile in late 2020. After the Constitutional Court rejected his candidacy for the December 2020 presidential election, citing an outstanding arrest warrant and UN sanctions, the coalition was formed to disrupt the vote and overthrow President Faustin-Archange Touadéra. The government accused Bozizé of plotting a coup, and although he initially denied a leading role, he took formal charge of the coalition as its general coordinator in early 2021. Its political leadership later relocated to N'Djamena in neighbouring Chad, and Bozizé himself went into exile, moving to Guinea-Bissau in 2023. He had been placed under UN sanctions, and in September 2023 he was sentenced in absentia by a Central African court.
In its first weeks the coalition seized a string of towns and advanced on the capital, but its attempt to take Bangui in January 2021 failed. Government forces, backed by Russian paramilitaries from the Wagner Group and by Rwandan troops, repelled the offensive and drove the CPC out of most major towns during 2021, after which the coalition turned to guerrilla attacks, ambushes, and kidnapping for ransom from peripheral and border areas.
The CPC's composition was fluid throughout its existence. The UPC withdrew in April 2021 before rejoining later that year, and in November 2023 the MPC, led by Mahamat al-Khatim, announced its withdrawal from the coalition and its willingness to return to dialogue under the Khartoum agreement. The most serious rupture came in 2024, when Ali Darassa of the UPC announced a cessation of hostilities with the government and was expelled from the coalition. In August 2024 he and Noureddine Adam of the FPRC formed a breakaway, the Coalition of Patriots for Change - Fundamental (CPC-F), while the 3R remained within the original CPC under Bozizé.
The decline accelerated in 2025. The UPC and the 3R signed a Chad-mediated ceasefire in April and were formally dissolved in July, entering a disarmament process. In October 2025 the government announced the dissolution of the anti-Balaka Ngaïssona faction, another founding member, and in November 2025 the MPC signed its own Chad-mediated peace agreement in N'Djamena, agreeing to cease hostilities, end its activities in three prefectures, withdraw its fighters, and enter the disarmament process, weeks before the December 2025 elections. By late 2025 these departures and dissolutions had hollowed out the CPC, leaving a weakened and internally divided coalition whose remaining factions continued to carry out attacks, kidnappings, and extortion. Bozizé remained its self-proclaimed coordinator from exile in Guinea-Bissau.
Analysts have generally described the CPC as an opportunistic alliance rather than a coherent political movement, with little unifying it beyond opposition to Touadéra. Its member groups retained separate ethnic bases, territories, and revenue streams, sustaining themselves through control of gold and diamond mining, the taxation of cattle herders, and ransom kidnappings.
